Reacquainted
by Person4
Summary: Between "Web Riders on the Storm" and "Mousetrap" Bob takes some time to catch up with Matrix. Written for the Yuletide rare pairings and fandom challenge.


I don't own anything here, I'm just playing for awhile.   
  
This fic takes place between Web Riders on the Storm and Mousetrap. Please ignore anything that's contradicted by the events of season four, since I've only seen about 25 minutes of it, spread across three episodes back when it first aired. This was originally written for the The Obscure Fandom Secret Santa Project where I recieved the pairing Bob/Matrix. Then my original idea took longer to write then I thought it would, so I had to quickly throw something else off. This is that.   
  
If someone can come up with a better idea of whose name sprites would take in vain, that would be great. In the original version I used User, but really the user would be more of a devil figure. This time I used Programmer, since that seems like it would be a more suitable god-figure, but it still doesn't feel quite right. For one thing, it's too long to really spit out properly.   
  
Mainframe time:  
_Nanosecond_: Second  
_Nano_: Minute  
_Microsecond_: Hour  
_Second_: Day  
_Cycle_: Week  
_Minute_: Month  
_Hour_: Year  
_Year_: Decade   
  
* * *   
  
"Hey, thanks for letting me stay in your room Bob," Matrix said, plopping down into the one chair in the small room Capt. Capacitor had provided for Bob on the Saucy Mare. "I want to give AndrAIa a chance to rest up before we get to Mainframe."   
  
Bob was sprawled across the bed, evidently enjoying having a real mattress to lie on. "Hey, no problem! This'll give us a chance to catch up. We won't have much of a chance once we're back home and everyone else get a hold on us."   
  
Matrix actually gave a small, incredulous laugh and a tiny smile. "Programmer, _home_. I can't believe it's actually a second or two away."   
  
"I know what you mean. It seems almost impossible to be this close after searching for so long." After saying this Bob looked a bit embarrassed as he glanced at Matrix. "Of course, I haven't been searching nearly as long as the three of you were. If you don't mind my asking, how long were the three of you travelling anyway?"   
  
Matrix tilted the chair back, resting his feet on the edge of the bed and just barely missing kicking Bob's hand as he closed his eyes to think. "It's hard to say," he said. "We stopped keeping track after awhile. AndrAIa thought it was getting discouraging. Over a year, four sure. Maybe by... three or four hours? Maybe a little more."   
  
Bob looked at Matrix wordlessly for a moment, a distressed look on his face, before saying, "Fourteen _hours_? Programmer Enzo, I'm so sorry."   
  
Matrix let the chair fall forward and his eyes flew open as he said, not even thinking to insist on being called Matrix, "Why would you be sorry? It's hardly _your_ fault. I'm the one who managed to get his eye gouged out and couldn't finish the game." At the sight of Bob's widening eyes Matrix had to suppress the urge to slap himself in the forehead. Talking to Bob, even for such a short while, made him feel like they'd never been separated. Somehow, just for that moment, he'd forgotten Bob hadn't been there to see his failure. "Look, the point is, it's not your fault."   
  
"Yes it is. If I hadn't trusted Megabyte, I would have been around to--"   
  
"Look, can we just drop it? What's done is done, it's pointless to keep discussing it," Matrix snapped, his patience with this line of conversation having come to an end.   
  
"Uh, ok." Bob looked a little taken aback by how suddenly Matrix's mood had soured, and the two of them sat in awkward silence for a long moment before he hesitantly said, "So... you and AndrAIa are together now?" He assumed that that would be a safe topic of conversation.   
  
"Yeah, for now. Probably not for long."   
  
Bob raised an eyebrow, rolling over onto his side to get a better view of Matrix. "Why would you say that?"   
  
Matrix shrugged. "Because it's true. We've never stayed together long when we got stuck in a system that didn't get many games."   
  
"But, the two of you seem so good together. If you'd asked me while we were all still in Mainframe I would have sworn the two of you would end up together." He failed to mention that quite a bit of that assumption was based on the fact that there were no other young sprites in Mainframe for Enzo to end up with.   
  
"Funny how things don't turn out like you plan, isn't it? Don't get me wrong, I love AndrAIa, and I know she feels the same way. But, under normal circumstances, we're really not each others types."   
  
"Ok, I can understand that. But then, why are you together to begin with?"   
  
Matrix looked a little troubled as he thought about the question, and his eyes grew distant. "It's-- You don't know what it's like in the games after they end. Everything shuts down. Nothing moves, and there's no noises or colors anywhere. It's like we're the only things alive anywhere. Sometimes this goes on for whole minutes before the user decides to play it again. It's lonely, and I know that's a stupid reason to start interfacing with someone, but at least we could get some comfort from each other, and it's not like either of us was expecting more." His voice had gotten increasingly hostile through the last sentence, as he was halfway expecting Bob to break in at any moment to tell him how wrong he thought it was for Matrix to have conducted a relationship like that. Instead he found, when his eyes focused on Bob's face again, that the guardian was staring at him with a clearly pitying look. That was almost worse, though it did wipe the hostility right out of him. "Anyway, it's not like we find each other physically repulsive, and we didn't have anyone else. Now that we're out of the games I'll be happy for her whoever she ends up with. Well, so long as it isn't that Surfr bastard."   
  
While trying to process all this Bob absently said, "I have to wonder what your type is, considering that most sprites I can think of would probably give their left hands to be with a girl like her."   
  
"Well..." Matrix trailed off with a frown, forehead furrowed as he had some sort of internal debate. After a long moment, during which Bob wondered if he'd managed to say the exact wrong thing to the renegade and was about to be pounded into the floor, he seemed to come to a decision. "Alright," he said quietly, and Bob had a nanosecond to think that Matrix sounded more like he was talking to himself then to Bob before the sprite leaned over and was kissing him.   
  
It was strange, Matrix thought in some distant point of his mind. He had imagined this moment often in his childhood, not even really knowing what he was doing but worshipping Bob and wanting nothing more then to be with him forever. Then, when he was older and did realise what it was that he wanted it was to late; Bob was lost in the net and he in the games. That hadn't stopped him from fantasising, though he'd long since given up hope on the fantasies coming true. Now, after all this time, here they were and Bob... was not kissing him back. He didn't push him away either, and when Matrix hesitantly tried to deepen the kiss he opened his mouth to him, but made other movements just letting Matrix do as he pleased.   
  
Matrix pulled away and stood up with a sigh, leaving Bob lying on the bed with a shell-shocked look on his face. "Yeah, I thought that was a bad idea," he said, avoiding looking at Bob as he quickly crossed the room and pulled some extra blankets and a pillow out of the closet. "I'll be sleeping on the deck if you need me."   
  
As Matrix reached for the doorknob Bob seemed to grab hold of himself and said, "Wait, Enzo!"   
  
"The _name_ is _Matrix_," he growled, though he did stop where he stood, back still turned away from Bob.   
  
"Fine, wait _Matrix_." Bob hopped to his feet and quickly crossed the room, clapping his hand down heavily on Matrix's shoulder. "You don't need to go."   
  
Matrix snorted and shook off Bob's hand. "Thanks, but I don't like staying somewhere where I've just embarrassed myself."   
  
"You didn't embarrass yourself. I was just shocked, that's all."   
  
"Really." Though his voice was still cold Matrix's stance untensed a little and he turned his head the slightest bit in Bob's direction.   
  
"Really. I'm-- You're--" Bob sighed heavily and moved to lean against the wall, facing Matrix. "It's hard, picturing you in my mind as the little sprite you were and seeing you like," he waved his hand vaguely in the air, "this. _Programmer_, you're almost as old as I am now. You're older then your big sister! And then there's the whole Dot thing to work out once we're back in Mainframe, though I know how slim the chances of anything ever happening is. Still there're loose ends to tie up, and closure needed." He leaned his head back against the wall and stared up at the ceiling, and his words sped up to a near babble. "All this aside, I'm not... _against_ the idea of you and me together, and while I'd have _never_ have said so if you didn't make the first move I... don't find you unattractive. At all. And, after I've gotten to know this you, and we've gotten our lives pulled back together I'd be willing to, um, to _try_ this. You and me, I mean. If we're both still interested once we've gotten to know each other again."   
  
Hope. Matrix was feeling _hope_ he realised, almost starting at the thought. And maybe even a little happiness. He felt both emotions so rarely that both were almost unrecognisable to him. "I'm good at waiting," he said with a small wry smile. "Take an hour if that's what you need, after the past year that's nothing." He slowly reached out and wrapped his hand around Bob's wrist, tugging the guardian closer gently. "But first, could I try this one more time?" he murmured as he leaned down to kiss Bob once again.   
  
It was strange that Bob's lips were softer the AndrAIa's. He had never imagined that, since in all his other experiences with men their lips had been thinner then hers, and often chapped. He couldn't resist sweeping his tongue over his bottom lip, then biting down on it gently.   
  
For a long nano they stood like that, neither moving to deepen the kiss further or pull away. Then Matrix's arms moved to encircle Bob, and his tongue pressed lightly against his teeth which opened for him without hesitation. Bob's mouth still tasted faintly of the rom which Matrix now remembered Capacitor had all but forced into him earlier, and for a brief instant he worried that without the alcohol in Bob's body none of this would be happening. Then he forcefully pushed those doubts aside, determined to let himself be happy even if it was just for a short while. Besides, he didn't think Bob was acting drunk.   
  
Finally, grudgingly, he pulled away, arms falling once more to his sides. He didn't want to, knowing full well that it could be a long time, if ever, before this happened again. Still, if he didn't let go then, he didn't trust that he'd ever be able to. "We should get to sleep," he said, surprised to find that he sounded a little bit breathless. "I mean, we'll be back in Mainframe in a second or two, and who knows what might meet us."   
  
"Yes. Sleep. Sleep is good, very good." Bob glanced at the blankets and pillow that Matrix had absently dropped on the floor before they kissed and said, "So, do you still want to sleep on the deck? The bed's big enough for two. To sleep in."   
  
Matrix glanced from the bed to Bob and back again, mentally weighing the certain frustration that would come from lying next to Bob all night without anything other then sleep happening, and happiness that would come from lying next to Bob all night, even without anything other then sleep happening. The choice was easy. "Alright, but I get the side away from the wall."   
  
The smile Bob threw him was warm and affectionate. "Whatever makes you happy." 


End file.
